One of the most embattled members of the College of Cardinals, retired Los Angeles archbishop Roger Mahony, says that the Vatican told him he had to come to the conclave to help elect a successor to Pope Benedict XVI.

CANTERBURY, England (RNS) Days after pulling out of the conclave to elect the next pope and vowing to fight the charges against him, disgraced Scottish Cardinal Keith O’Brien admitted Sunday (March 3) to inappropriate “sexual conduct.”

(RNS) Amid all the fevered speculation about who might succeed Pope Benedict XVI, one possibility seems particularly tantalizing: that the conclave could elect an African to be the first black pontiff in the nearly 2,000 year history of the papacy. But would it be a first?

(RNS) If far less expensive and not quite as mind-numbing as a U.S. presidential campaign, the condensed version of papal campaign politics is not much gentler, or necessarily more effective. Instead it can be nasty, brutish and short.

(RNS) Cardinal Keith O’Brien of Scotland resigned on Monday in the wake of explosive charges that he had made “inappropriate” sexual advances to three priests and a former seminarian, and said he would skip next month’s conclave to elect a successor to Pope Benedict XVI.

(RNS) Will the conclave electing a successor to Pope Benedict XVI next month have an “Obama moment” and pick a pope from outside Europe for the first time in modern history? Several factors are working against it.

VATICAN CITY (RNS) The Vatican confirmed that Pope Benedict XVI is considering changing church law regulating the election of a new pope, but stopped short of saying whether he would authorize an earlier start to the conclave.

VATICAN CITY (RNS) As of 8 p.m. Thursday, the Vatican will go into “sede vacante” mode — a Latin expression that means that the seat of St. Peter is vacant. Here’s what will happen and who rules the church during the “interregnum” between two popes.